When I was a child, we often slept with the windows open in our unair-conditioned house. At night, I could sometimes hear a train off in the distance. To me, the thrumming, throbbing pulse of the train sounded like a giant stomping across the hills. And, of course, anything you imagine is ten times more real when you imagine it in bed, when you’re supposed to be asleep.
I was so afraid of that giant and I knew he was going to stride right over the hilltop outside my window at any moment. Which placed me in a quandary. Did I open the curtains, so I could see him coming? Or did I leave the curtains closed, so he couldn’t see me?
Seriously, I lost some childhood sleep pondering this question. Throw the curtain back so my view is clear? Or cower behind the fluttery, white fabric? Well, guess what. It didn’t matter in the least. There was no giant. There was no seeing in or seeing out. There was nothing to worry about.
Will I be published? Or is all this writing for naught?
Will I meet my goals at work? Or will I fail utterly?
Will I meet people’s expectations? Or will they discover I’m a fraud?
Will I ever learn to trust God? Or will He keep having to grab my attention?
OR does God have a wonderful, amazing, heaven-shaking plan that I can’t even begin to imagine?
How much of your life have you wasted worrying? How much sleep have you lost pondering two equally foolish options? I’ve told the train as giant story before, as an example of the folly of childhood. But have I really grown up? Or am I still worrying about the coming giant that’s really just a train headed in another direction altogether?
Matthew 6:27 & 34 – Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life? Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.
Meet Sarah
I’ve heard people say that an approaching tornado sounds like a locomotive coming at you full steam. And, as you say, worrying about it doesn’t help a bit in that case. But you can run for shelter! And hope and pray that it is indeed heading in another direction… Just sayin’. A little off topic, I realize.
And timely–several states have been slammed by tornadoes in the last few days. I like your pragmatism, though. Just because worrying doesn’t help is no reason to avoid taking action!
When you are having thoughts like this, just remember famous “failures” in history. Let’s see, there’s Abraham Lincoln who lost twelve elections before winning his first one (that was his presidential bid!). Then there’s Thomas Edison. What would have happened to his role in our history if he had given up after when testing his 999th failed light bulb filament? The best batters in baseball hit 300 or a little better. That means they strike out seven times out of ten. Winston Churchill failed the 6th grade. John Grisham’s first novel was rejected by sixteen agents and twelve publishing houses. Henry Ford’s first two automobile companies failed. When Albert Einstein was young, his parents thought he was mentally retarded. During his childhood, Steven Spielberg dropped out of junior high school. He was persuaded to come back and was placed in a learning-disabled class. He only lasted a month and then dropped out of school forever. Before the start of his career, Beethoven’s music teacher once said of him “as a composer, he is hopeless”. And during his career, he lost his hearing yet he managed to produce great music – a deaf man composing music, ironic isn’t it! R. H. Macy started seven failed business before finally hitting big with his store in New York City. Walt Disney himself had a bit of a rough start. He was fired by a newspaper editor because, “he lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” After that, Disney started a number of businesses that didn’t last too long and ended with bankruptcy and failure. He kept plugging along, however, and eventually found a recipe for success that worked. After numerous attempts at creating flying machines, several years of hard work, and tons of failed prototypes, the Wright Brothers finally created a plane that could get airborne and stay there. In his first film, Harrison Ford was told by the movie execs that he simply didn’t have what it takes to be a star. Recluse and poet Emily Dickinson is a commonly read and loved writer. Yet in her lifetime she was all but ignored, having fewer than a dozen poems published out of her almost 1,800 completed works. There are lots more, but you get the idea. Keep on writing!
Thanks Steve! Of course, Emily preferred her anonymity. Man, she’d really be lost in today’s world of self-promotion!
That’s it! I haven’t been reading enough Wendell Berry lately.
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief…. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. ~Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things”